EXCLUSIVE: Chelsea's Marc Cucurella on what makes Lionel Messi the best, the quality he'd steal from Erling Haaland and Cesar Azpilicueta's dodgy dress sense

Cucurella has already played alongside some stellar names in his career after featuring for Barcelona, Brighton and Chelsea but is in no doubt at all about which player is the very best.

The defender came through Barcelona's famed La Masia academy and naturally picked the star everyone there looked up to.

"Lionel Messi, because for me he is the No. 1 in the world. I played with him at Barcelona and I trained with him a lot," he told GOAL on Simply The Best. "The most incredible thing is that when you watch the game he’s walking a lot, [but] he’s watching everything, watching the space. And then when he receives the ball he has the information and the gaps in his mind [so] he is ready to ‘kill’ the other team."

Cucurella left Spain for Brighton in a move which has seen him come up against some of the game's best strikers in the Premier League, including a certain Erling Haaland.

When quizzed about which attribute he'd steal from any player, and what it would be, Cucurella picked out the Manchester City ace and one particular strength the Norwegian possesses.

"Maybe Erling Haaland. Not the skill, but the power, because he always stays in the [right] position to score a lot of goals," he explained. "Maybe he doesn’t have [just] one best attribute, but I think he [can] always smell where the goal is.”

Cucurella has also had the lowdown some of his Chelsea team-mates, revealing which player is the best dressed at Stamford Bridge.

"Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. He loves fashion, the moda, he has a lot of good outfits to come to training," said the defender. "[But] the worst dressed is Cesar Azpilicueta, because his clothes are what grandfathers use! [laughs] His style is for old people."

Check out the full episode of Simply The Best on GOAL's YouTube channel.